A Whole New World (Disney Twisted Tales) - Liz Braswell Page 0,77

the Moon Tower. It contained the library—which, at least before Jafar became sultan, was not a particularly well-guarded part of the compound, according to Jasmine. Aladdin waved Morgiana and Duban forward and pointed at the lowest window that was wider than an arrow loop.

The three of them started to run across the short stretch of open field. Sensing something, Aladdin stopped short. He skidded to a halt just as a strange red light swept in front of his path. He looked up.

Hanging in the air above them, silent as death, was a pair of ghouls. As their dead eyes moved inhumanly across the landscape below, one of them slowly swung a strange black lantern with an intricate hood that directed the red beam.

The three thieves froze. Morgiana whispered an expletive.

Time also froze as the dead things made an agonizingly slow pass across the courtyard and then back. The sky behind them was black as sin. It was the darkest time of the night…which meant that dawn wasn’t far off. Aladdin felt his heart skip furiously within his still body.

Eventually the beam continued past them on its steady path and kept going.

The ghouls moved on, soundlessly patrolling the night with their evil lamp.

Was it Aladdin’s imagination? Or did the grass look drier after the light passed over it? Did it somehow look less than it had looked before?

The three thieves made a dash for the relative safety of the shadow of the tower.

“What terrible new magic is that?” Duban cried.

“There is a special place in hell reserved for Jafar,” Morgiana muttered. “And his servants.”

“I feel sorry for whoever those two once were,” Aladdin said pointedly. Although, privately, he thought it might not have been such a terrible thing if the men had died a little more explosively and left no bodies behind to reanimate.

Morgiana pulled out a tiny-clawed grapple—one of her favorite tools—and, after swinging it on the end of its slim silken cord a few times, let it loose. With a neat kkrrrlkt it landed inside the window. She tugged and it held, digging its claws into the plaster. Duban motioned for the other two to go first while he held the cord steady. Morgiana and Aladdin scurried up it like monkeys and then he hurried up after them.

After he pulled his stocky body through the window, he paused and looked around in wonder. “Wow. Not what I’d want in my own castle…but impressive, nonetheless.”

It was a giant room filled with shelves and cabinets and drawers. Occupying every nook and cranny were tiny statues of everything: people long dead and beasts that never were and buildings that seemed unlikely. The remaining space was taken up with books. There were piles of books on the floor, stacks on the tables, shelves stuffed with books lining all the walls. Dozens of urns held hundreds of rolled-up scrolls. Wax and clay tablets with ledgers in strange languages sat in open drawers. Maps of colorful oceans and strange countries lay unrolled on special slanted tables.

The room was dim, just as Jasmine had predicted; only two small lamps burned at the door, far away from any of the flammable parchments or precious scrolls. It was hard to tell just how big the library was or how much it held. Aladdin began to understand a little more about Jasmine. She had access to all of that knowledge—all the collected information and wisdom of the world, it seemed—and couldn’t go out to see it for herself.

“Aladdin!” Duban suddenly hissed, interrupting his thoughts. He crept up to the doorway and listened. “Guards are coming! Two, I think.”

“Already?” Morgiana cursed. “This mission is doomed.”

“Quickly!” Aladdin gestured for her to move to the other side of the door.

There was no place for Aladdin to hide; the tables and desks were all tall with narrow, elegant—and very hard-to-hide-behind—legs. This seemed to be the one room in the palace without a divan or couch.

Unable to think of anything else to do, Aladdin picked up a scroll and began to make a big show of studying it.

Two human guards appeared in the doorway to give the room a cursory check—and then saw Aladdin.

They scowled and drew their scimitars.

“Funny,” Aladdin drawled, turning the scroll upside down and frowning. “I always thought the Hyperboreans lived in the north, not the south.…”

The guard on the left recovered from his shock first and opened his mouth to order Aladdin to do something or other.

Before a single peep came out, Morgiana and Duban grabbed a couple of large